


hold me fast and fear me not

by Kitty Eden (TheBigCat)



Series: unfold your own myth [3]
Category: Bernice Summerfield (Books & Audio), Doctor Who & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - High School, Ballad 39: Tam Lin, Body Horror, Fae & Fairies, Fae politics, Gen, Minor Character Death, Sort Of, Strange Questionable Friendships, True Names, in which my passion for mythology leaks out into platonic bennybrax once more
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:14:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26813482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBigCat/pseuds/Kitty%20Eden
Summary: The events leading up to a seventeen-year-old Bernice Summerfield violently rugby-tackling some guy whose name she doesn’t even know off a horse in the dead of the night in the middle of a haunted forest are... a bit complicated.Or maybe they just involve a long string of Summerfield-brand Bad Life Choices. Well. Either way.
Relationships: Irving Braxiatel & Bernice Summerfield
Series: unfold your own myth [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1746379
Comments: 15
Kudos: 19





	hold me fast and fear me not

**Author's Note:**

> Title from multiple versions of the Tam Lin ballad.

Bernice Summerfield is ten years old and covered in dirt and is still the sort of young girl who absolutely detests the color pink on principle for no good reason, when _he_ shows up for the first time. She’s poking around at the bottom of her garden with a battered half-full diary tucked under one arm and a shovel yoinked from her dad’s toolshed, currently on hour three of procrastinating reading comprehension homework and trying to find the empirical best place to start digging for the ancient treasure that she knows is buried _somewhere_ in her backyard. Out front is a bust – her mum had been stupidly mad over her careful excavation of the rose patch, even though those roses had been _unfairly_ ugly and really, they had it coming from the start.

So here’s the backyard, and here’s her shovel, and she’s flipping through to the back of her diary to the page where she’d drawn the map of Where To Dig, when a voice from beyond the backyard fence says, “Are you looking for something?”

Bernice Summerfield does not jump and she most certainly doesn’t let out a frightened squeal, because she is _mature_ and also not the sort of person that goes jumping and squealing at unexpected disturbances. She does, however, slam her diary shut, clutching it tightly to her chest.

“ _Excuse me,_ ” she says, when she realizes that she’s not, in fact, having a heart attack. She whirls around to the fence to see who it is that’s so intent on disturbing her procrastination time. “Do you mind? This is _my_ backyard, and I think – ” She stops, abruptly.

There is _someone_ looking in through the gate in the fence that leads out to the fields beyond her backyard. Past the fields, there’s the forest – which is why the gate is usually kept firmly locked. Today, the gate is not locked. It’s been pushed wide open and the lock is nowhere to be seen, and the someone is standing in the open gap, framed by wood and grass and sky – not making a move to enter. Watching her curiously.

“...Hello,” she says.

He inclines his head politely. “Good afternoon.”

He’s not a boy and he’s not a man and he’s not a kid even though he’s just about the same height as her when she squints, and his voice is deep enough and smooth enough that she should be able to say he’s a lot older than her, but there’s something to it that makes her think _wait_ and _no._ It’s hard to tell what age he is, really; all grey misty eyes and weird clothes that aren’t _exactly_ old-fashioned, not really, but would probably get him laughed out of the playground anyway if he bothered to show his face there.

Bernice isn’t stupid. She’s the opposite of stupid, as a matter of fact, and everybody else says that this makes her a bit of a nightmare to be around. (If any of them knew as much as her, they’d probably throw around words like ‘insufferable’ and ‘arrogant’, but as it is, she’s the only person she knows who knows those particular words so far.) And she knows a Good Neighbour when she sees one.

“I should probably warn you,” she says, fingers wrapping around the edges of her journal tightly. She’s a tiny bit frightened, because again, she’s not _stupid_ , but she’s sure enough of herself that she’s definitely not going to show that any more than she has to. “I’m not giving you my name. So if that’s what you’re here for, you might as well just head off back to your forest. Or try again with some other kid. Simon Kyle lives three doors down,” she adds, nodding in the relevant direction, “and he’s a jerk and an idiot, so – shouldn’t have too much trouble there. Easy catch.”

The Good Neighbour actually laughs. “That’s appreciated,” he says. “But unnecessary. I have no intention of stealing your name.”

“Oh, now – that’s interesting,” she says, raising an eyebrow. (She’s very recently perfected the art of doing this, and is inordinately proud of herself.)

“What is?”

“I thought fairies couldn’t lie.”

“We cannot,” he says with a faint downwards twist of his lip, which – well, it confirms what he is, at the very least. He leans on the outside of the gate, hands at the edge of the invisible barrier without ever touching or crossing it. “May I come in?”

“You may _not_ ,” Bernice says.

She knows she should probably yell for her parents or shut the gate or, better yet, just _leave_ – run into the house without interacting further with this fairy, because the longer she spends talking the more likely it is that she’ll slip up and end up in eternal servitude to the Erlking or something terrible like that. But life in Little Caldwell is so _boring,_ and this is better than homework on every conceivable level, and also she’s not going to slip up because she’s _not an idiot._

“If you’re not here to steal my name, then what _are_ you here for?” she asks him.

“Are you looking for something?” he repeats. This isn’t technically an answer, and they both know it.

“I’m looking for many things,” she says, and crouches down to poke studiously at the ground in front of her. She’s not going to start excavating _now_ , not with this stranger watching, but maybe if he thinks she’s ignoring him, he might let some things slip, out of desperation. “Most people are. Right now I’m looking for a distraction.”

“In the dirt?” The stranger frowns. “Dreadful place to look for distractions.”

“I disagree,” says Bernice, “but all right.”

“Personally, I find the forest a much more interesting place,” he continues.

“You would, yes,” Bernice says, fully aware of the fact that he’s trying to entice her into the forest to join the fairy court forever or whatever. “I, however, have a dig plan for this afternoon. And I’m planning on sticking to it. You can go and climb a tree or something if you want, but _I’m_ busy.”

“Oh,” he says. “Can I have your name, at least?” he asks, and e sounds so genuinely disappointed that she actually feels bad. She opens her mouth and is on the verge of telling him, when she _remembers._ She shuts her mouth abruptly, and glares.

“You _said_ ,” she says. “You _told me_ you weren’t here to steal my name.”

He smiles. It’s a surprisingly nice smile, although it doesn’t entirely reach his eyes. “I’m not,” he says. “Which in no way means I can’t try anyway, as a way to pass the time. It gets dreadfully boring around here, doesn’t it?”

“It does,” she agrees, somewhat reluctantly, “but that’s no excuse. Go away. I’m not inviting you into my garden and I’m not giving you my name and I’m _definitely_ not giving you anything else you might want. So just – ” She flounders for words for a moment, and then settles on one that’s either very appropriate or extremely inappropriate, depending on who you’d ask. “ – just bugger off!”

“Oh, dear me!” says the fairy. “Such strong words from a charming young lady.”

“Excuse _you,_ I am none of those things,” says Bernice, highly offended.

“My apologies,” he says, holding up his hands. “Such strong words from a dirt-encrusted amateur hooligan.”

“And don’t you forget it,” she says, and points right at him with her shovel. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind – I have some serious archaeology work to get on with, and we’ve already established that you aren’t getting anything from me, today or ever, so...”

“Are you sure you’re not willing to give me a name?” says the fairy stranger, neatly ignoring the blatant hint. “It doesn’t have to be your real name. Not even close. I’d happily settle for a placeholder.”

“Nope,” she says, quite firmly. No names. I am completely nameless. Goodbye.”

“Stick, perhaps,” he says. “Or Leaf. I hear ‘Ainsel’ is a favorite in these parts. Just so I have something to call you. I may even give you mine in return,” he adds hopefully.

“ _Sure,_ ” says Bernice, and laughs. “And maybe the forest will burn to the ground spontaneously and no fairies will bother us ever again. Get out of here.”

He’s silent for a moment and then he says, “Goodbye, then.”

She nods, and crouches down to flick her diary open. “Bye,” she says. “See you never.”

And when she looks up to check, just seconds later, he’s gone.

*

The next time Bernice sees him, it’s nearly one full year later. It’s summer holidays, and she’s up a tree in the local park with her nose buried deep in a somewhat trashy YA novel about time travel and aliens and mushrooms and genocide (ridiculously unrealistic, but strangely compelling). Up in the branches of a tree is always a good place to read – it’s leafy and cool and for the most part, people don’t tend to look up to bother you.

She’s just up to the bit about the hero confronting the alien emperor when she happens to glance down at the park below her – and there he is. Meandering along the park path without a care in the world. She recognizes him as soon as she sees him, because although he’s hard to look at and hard to pin down, he’s not the sort of person that she’d easily forget. People don’t really look at him as he makes his way through the park – their gazes tend to slide right off him, and they move around him like repelled magnets. It’s actually kind of fascinating to watch. She wonders why it’s not affecting her. Is it just because she’s paying attention?

He slows down a bit as he reaches the tree she’s in, and Bernice struggles for a moment or two whether to actually say anything, before she reaches a conclusion.

“Oh,” she says loudly. “It’s you. Are you here to try and steal my name again?”

He actually looks startled when she speaks, looking around in a quite human-like panic – left and right and left again, before his gaze drifts upwards and he sees her in the tree. His head tilts sideways slowly, eyes narrowing, and then he says, “Ah!,” and then, “nameless dirt hooligan, I remember you. I was never trying to steal it in the first place, you know,” he adds, somewhat offhandedly.

“No?” Bernice says, trying to hide her surprise (and a tiny little surge of indignation) that he hadn’t, in fact, been here looking for her specifically.

“No,” he says, head tilted lightly upwards to look at her properly. “I recall being in the mood to talk with someone, anyone; and I also seem to recall that you were the only one willing to do so, even if for just a short time. I was... curious. And it is good to see you again.”

“Huh,” she says, processing that. “And what are you out here for this time, then? If you weren’t looking for me?”

“Can’t I enjoy a pleasant walk in the park on a lovely afternoon?”

“That was a question, not an answer,” she says, closing her book. “You like being tricky with your words, huh?”

“Rhetoric amuses me,” he says with a slight grin. “But – really, I _was_ only out for a walk.”

“And your whole Invisible Man routine...?”

“People do tend to get quite upset when they realize there’s a Kindly One in their midst,” he says with a sigh. “Especially in this town.”

They enjoy a comfortable silence for maybe a full minute before he asks for her name again.

“No,” she says. “Come on, you’re smarter than that. I said no – no means no.”

“I can’t just go around yelling out ‘hey, you’, every time I wish to gather your attention,” he says.

“You can and you will,” she says.

“How very demeaning for the both of us,” he says, and slides smoothly down to sit elegantly at the base of the tree. “Very well, then.”

She sighs and narrows her eyes and wonders to herself what on _earth_ she’s doing even _entertaining_ the idea she’s got in her head, and then (because impulse control is hard, even though she’s working on it, she really is) says, “ _Or._ ”

“Or?” says the fairy, looking up a bit too quickly.

“You can’t have my name,” says Bernice, “but if you want, you can call me Surprise.”

There’s a tingle that runs up and down her back as she says it; something otherworldly and ancient. It’s not entirely unpleasant, but it feels more than a little ominous.

“That was probably a mistake, you know,” says the fairy. It’s sing-song but not unkind. “Using a part of your _true_ name as a fae introduction is practically asking for trouble.”

“Yes, well,” says Bernice, not willing to admit that he’s most likely right – although she has a feeling he’s not going to take advantage of her slip-up. “No take-backs. Surprise it is. What about you?”

“ _Me?_ ” says the fairy, laying a hand on his heart. “What _about_ me?”

“Don’t give me that,” Bernice says. “Come on. A name for a name. It’s only fair – I thought your lot were all about being fair.”

“Only half of us,” he murmurs, more to himself than her, and then, louder – “all right, then. Call me Trouble, I suppose.”

There’s no tingle this time, but she chalks that down to the fact that his offered name is probably nothing at all related to his _actual_ name – unlike hers; taken recklessly from her middle name. In retrospect, that was _definitely_ a dreadful idea. But like she’d said – no take-backs. She’s kind of stuck with this situation – might as well make the most of it.

“Nice to meet you properly, Trouble,” she tells him, and means it. “Now, are you going to climb this tree, or am I going to have to come down to you?”

*

Eleven-year-old Bernice turns twelve, then thirteen, and at fourteen she’s decided that if she ever makes any lasting human friends, they can call her Benny because she likes the sound of it. Trouble’s still showing up at least once per week and he’s _definitely_ her friend, as weird as that is, but she’s always going to be Surprise to him because as close as they’ve grown over the years, she still knows that giving your real name up to the Fair Folk is as close to suicide as you can get without actually dying. She’s playing a dangerous game, she knows – hadn’t been quite so aware of it when she had been tiny and full of herself, but the awareness is gradually beginning to dawn on her that spending so much time with him is probably a really fantastically bad idea. But really, it’s not like she has much other company to keep.

Nonetheless, he slides out of the shadows as she walks to school and keeps pace with her as she complains about teachers and commiserates with her about them (even though he couldn’t possibly know _anything_ about the horrors of small-town high school), and he bothers her through her screen window on alternating Tuesday evenings about joining him on forest expeditions (which she never does take him up on) and when she’s in the mood for getting dirt under her fingernails and a shovel into the ground – well, fairies really do have a fantastic sense for exactly where precious metals tend to be buried.

She learns things about him, over time. Not really personal details, just bits and pieces. He’s allergic to ginger. Cats don’t like him, not in the least. He’s part of the Winter court, and apparently if she were fae, she’d undoubtedly be a Spring. She has no idea how to feel about this assertion, but he seems pretty adamant about that, so.

Their conversations are fast-flowing exchanges of wry remarks and clever words, light and airy. He’s as quick-tongued as she is, and seems to thrive on pretentious nonsense. They are Trouble and Surprise; Surprise and Trouble, and although everybody calls her things like _weird_ and _insufferable_ (they’ve learned all the same words she had years ago) for having no friends and talking to shadows, she doesn’t really mind.

After Mum dies in the accident, he’s there – not at the funeral, that’s too exposed and there’s too many people that she barely cares about spouting meaningless platitudes right at her to even try to get close, and not right after the funeral, when Dad’s being too quiet and too loud all at once and he doesn’t even try to talk to her about it – but when it matters, he’s there. When she sneaks out through the back fence and into the fields and greets him with a carefully-held-together facade that she has no intention of breaking in front of him, and sits down under an oak tree with their arms barely bumping, he – nameless, indistinct, shadowy – is there. He draws her into a hug, awkward and uncertain, and whispers equally meaningless platitudes that are only technically true – _it will be better eventually_ and _I’m here_ – and somehow, _somehow,_ it really does make her feel a miniscule amount better better.

It’s strange, but he really is a very good friend.

*

She’s seventeen and outside near the school fence after a sudden, unexpected whole-school evacuation – apparently someone had left a burner unattended in one of the chemistry labs and ended up burning practically half the block down – when Trouble raps on the fence post right near her head, making her jump, and tells her that he needs a favour.

This is disconcerting for a number of reasons. The first is that he’s never asked her for a favour before in all the time that they’ve known each other. The second is that _fairies don’t ask for favours._ They just don’t. It’s not a thing they do, not from humans. And his expression and tone are serious enough that she puts aside her diary and turns to face him properly.

“To put it simply,” he says, when she asks him to elaborate, “I want out.”

Benny blinks, and then blinks again. “You – sorry, did you just say, _you want out?_ ”

“Yes,” he says. “I do not wish to reside as a member of the Court anymore. I would like to depart, to leave, to make my exit from the twisted wreck that the others of my species like to call a _society._ It is no longer fit for me to exist in, and might even be dangerous to my continued health and existence to do so. Please.” He catches her eye, and there’s a glint of what might be genuine desperation in there. “Help me.”

She sits there for a while, mouth slightly open. Thinking.

“...Wow,” she says, eventually.

“‘Wow’?” he echoes, eyebrows raising.

“I think that’s the most genuine I’ve ever heard you be in one go, ever,” she says. “Are you serious? – no, nevermind, don’t answer that, of course you’re serious. Just. _Wow._ ” She shakes her head, and laughs.

“Surprise,” he says, looking immensely frustrated. “I don’t think you grasp _quite_ how serious this request is. I am willing to do – to offer –” He swallows audibly, and struggles for a second, before saying. “ – any – well – quite nearly anything.”

Benny stops laughing, and looks at him through the fence evenly. “All right,” she says. “So this is important to you. I get that, sure. Why can’t you just, I don’t know, leave? Surely you don’t need me for that.”

“Oh, of course,” he says, voice dripping with sarcasm he’s unable to properly enact due to a genetic inability to lie. She sometimes thinks it must be hard for him. He has the sort of voice made for sarcasm. “My most insincere thanks for suggesting a course of action I had already thought of. I’m sure you consider that to be _immensely_ helpful. _No,_ I can’t just _leave._ It’s more complicated than that, which is why I’m here, asking for your help.”

“All right,” she says. “So just ask. Stop tiptoeing around it.”

“Tomorrow is the septennial sacrifice,” he says, getting to the point. “To you, that would be the equivalent of... a very formal and highly important ceremony. I am a high-ranking noble of the Unseelie Court, so I must attend.”

“All right, okay,” she says. The ‘high-ranking noble’ bit throws her for a moment, but it does make sense. He has the pretentious, ‘lord it over everyone’ vibe down cold. “But, er – sacrifice?”

“That’s not important,” he dismisses, which means it probably is and his perspective is skewed because the fairy-human cultural and moral divide is something that they both tend to forget about a lot. “But this is. If, to propose a hypothetical scenario, some non-Court individual were to interrupt the procession leading to the ritual site, and pull a certain Court member down from his horse...” He pauses, apparently unable to resist his flair for the dramatic, even when giving important-sounding information. “...a severance between that member and the rest of the Court would most likely occur, if the person pulling me – him – them – down was determined enough.” He draws in a deep breath. “There would no doubt be a number of gruesome animal transformations involved in this endeavour.”

“Oh,” she says. “Like Tam Lin! It’s even Halloween tomorrow.”

“Of course you’d know the legend,” he says, with a tone of voice that’s almost fond.

“Well, yeah, the folklore curriculum in Little Caldwell is pretty extensive.” She leans against the fence, and wraps her arms around her diary. “It kind of has to be. How much of that story is true, by the way – do you know?”

“Tam Lin? – oh,” he says, and sighs. “True enough, if the tales passed around from other courts are to be believed. Although it appears to be mostly cobbled together from many situations involving cross-species romance, shapeshifting encounters, and _far_ too many young men with name derivatives of ‘Thomas’.”

“Huh,” she says. “Is _your_ name Thomas?”

He actually snorts. “Hardly. Besides, I’m in no way human, and the Faerie Queen most certainly did not _‘steal me hence, alas, when I was but a child’_.” He sings the last bit in an offhanded sort of way that’s rich and smooth and makes Benny momentarily very dizzy until she bites her lip to snap herself out of it. “But, no. There’s not _much_ precedent for anyone leaving the Court, unless it’s through death or permanent coma, or some other equally horrible means. If this were to work...” He trails off meaningfully.

“It’d be unprecedented,” Benny guesses, and he nods – to which she continues. “Which means that it’s never worked before, which means that this is probably really stupidly dangerous. Got it.”

“Do you really think I’d be asking if I had any other options at my disposal?”

This is phrased as a question. She is understandably quite a bit sceptical because of this.

“So all I need to do is head out to the forest tomorrow night, hide in some bushes, tackle you from your horse and hold onto you as you’re forced to cycle through all of your Court-assigned fursonas – and then you’re free?”

He sighs. Deeply and pointedly. And then, reluctantly, nods.

“How dangerous is this?” she asks frankly, and watches him struggle to respond for a few minutes – opening his mouth, feeling the shape of the words that can’t come out because they aren’t the truth, shutting it again.

“Very,” he says after a long, long moment. “It’s – _ridiculously_ dangerous. Quite possibly more dangerous than any other thing you will do in your life. I wouldn’t blame you for getting up right now, walking away, and never speaking to me ever again.”

Benny thinks about this for a moment, and then nods. “All right,” she says. “I just wanted to hear you say it. Where do I need to go?”

If he’s surprised, he hides it from her very well. She passes him her diary, and he draws a meticulously neat little map in a spare page, and talks it over with her until she’s pretty sure she knows exactly what to do and how to do it.

“What do you want from me in return?” he says, looking faintly exhausted just at the prospect. “Like I said – just about anything. Gold and riches tend to be popular, I’m told; or perhaps you’re looking for a blessing or a curse. I’m a bit rusty on those, I must say, but I’m not planning on double-crossing you with a half-hearted spell, so if I really must brush up – ”

“No,” says Benny thoughtfully, “no, I don’t think I want any of those.”

“Ah,” he says, and he sounds like he’s just been delivered a death sentence. “I see. Well, immortality is... somewhat tricky. But I’m sure I can – ”

“What I really need,” says Benny, “is a partner for my English Literature presentation next week.”

There’s a moment of silence.

“...What,” says Trouble.

“I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but I don’t exactly have a lot of friends. And this project is, to put it bluntly, kind of killing me. I’m lazier than I look, and solo assignments all the time? _Ugh._ No thanks.”

Benny pauses to take in the expression on that indistinct hazy face of his. She has a feeling that if she could see it properly, it’d be absolutely hilarious.

“Look,” she says. “Let me put it like this. If you’re powerful enough to do the riches and curses and immortality thing, do you think you could handle maybe magicking your way into getting enrolled at the school, preferably in my year? It’s boring without you, and it’d be nice to have a friend people can _see._ ”

“Let me get this straight,” says Trouble. “I am centuries old. A conduit for magic itself, a high-ranking member of the Unseelie court, more powerful than you could possibly comprehend; and you want me to periodically attend what you have once described as ‘literal hell on Earth’, because... you miss my company when you’re in class.”

“Yep,” she says. “Is that all right with you, then?”

He lets out a short, surprised laugh, and then it turns into a longer, more hysterical laugh, and by the time that he’s resting his head against the other side of the schoolyard fence, she’s pretty sure there might be some tears involved. She settles for awkwardly reaching through the gap and patting him on the shoulder, which he seems to appreciate.

“Yes,” he says about a minute later, when the emotional outburst has subsided somewhat and his hands are only slightly shaking, “yes, of _course_ I will. I... would be honoured, Surprise. Thank you.”

“Good,” she says, and pats him on the shoulder once more, “because tackling fairies off horses in the middle of the damn night is one thing, but I do _not_ want to have to face my English teacher when she finds out that I haven’t done any work at all on my class presentation, _again._ ”

*

Sensible running shoes, a loose faded Isley Brothers t-shirt, and jeans. It’s probably not the most dramatically appropriate clothing for a midnight fae showdown, but Benny’s more concerned about being practical. She _could_ pull out a long green skirt and hitch it up above her knee and go dashing off into the roses tonight, but she’d probably trip and kill herself doing it, which wouldn’t be great for anyone involved.

She packs a small bag with her phone and a spare flashlight and her diary, just in case she needs to check the map, and slips out of the window, shuttering the screen back into place behind her. She waits for a few moments, just in case she’s woken Dad up, but after about a minute of silence, steals out through the backyard and through the gate and out towards the forest.

She’s never gone into the forest before now. Which doesn’t sound like a thing that should be correct, but – it’s common knowledge that people _die_ if they go into the forest, or else they go missing mysteriously, and then stumble out months later with a dazed expression and no knowledge that any time has passed – and that’s just something that Benny really isn’t all that interested in getting involved in. But some things are worth breaking a lifetime of not getting nabbed by the fairies for, and Benny figures that if she’s been explicitly invited in by one of them, she at least has a half-decent chance of not ending up displaced in time for a few months.

She finds the spot Trouble had indicated, picks out a nice leafy patch of shrubbery, and hunkers down to wait – wishing she’d thought to bring a jacket, because it really is ridiculously cold tonight. Or maybe it’s something else in the air that’s making her shiver.

It doesn’t take all that long for it to start.

First, it’s the bells. Otherworldly and echoing, but impossible to tell what direction they’re coming from. It’s music without it being actual music – there’s some sort of melody to it, but not any one that makes sense to her ears. Then, it’s the chatter. There are people talking to each other, casually and cheerfully, and quite a few of them too. But it’s melodic and strange, somehow discordant with the sounds of the wind in the trees and the distant bells.

And then Benny hears hoofbeats, and the procession comes into view.

There’s maybe twenty of them in total, all riding horses of various colors and breeds – all equally covered in blossoms and vines and shiny bits of crystal and stone that are woven into the saddles and manes, catching in the bright moonlight.

The fae rider at the very head of the procession is so beautiful it hurts to look at her. She’s perfect in such a way that it almost circles back around into horrifying. Her long robes flow out behind her and merging smoothly with the shadows and every absence of light, and her midnight-black steed has too many teeth in all the wrong places.

Benny can’t look away from her for a second, but then she reminds herself that she has to. She scans along the procession – they’re not exactly moving _very_ fast but there’s still not a lot of time to waste. She sees more black horses, and brown ones, and at the back, a single white horse with someone distinctly more human than the rest of them, slumped over the horse’s mane – hands bound, apparently barely conscious.

 _Oh,_ she thinks, remembering the ‘sacrifice’ bit that Trouble had so easily glossed over the previous day. She squints, trying to get a good look, and realizes that he can’t be older than she is. Shaggy brown hair and torn jeans and bare feet. She actually recognizes him vaguely from school.

A cold feeling takes up residence in her stomach, and it’s something like regret and something like horror. She clenches her fists and rises into a crouch, and looks for Trouble. It takes her several seconds longer than she’d like, but then her eyes fix on the fairy rider in the deep blue cloak whose laughter is more polite and forced than anything and whose hands are tight on the reins, and she thinks, _there he is._

The moment that she springs out of the bushes, she realizes that she has no idea how she’s actually going to do this, but by that point it’s far too late to think too hard about it. She just grits her teeth and starts running at a dead sprint, right towards the grey horse carrying her friend – and she leaps at him, grabbing him in a clumsy rugby tackle. He lets out an involuntary noise of surprise, and then they hit the ground painfully together, rolling over and over before coming to a halt in the leafy dirt.

“Good evening,” Trouble whispers into her ear, polite as anything, and Benny has to fight valiantly to prevent herself from breaking out into hysterical giggles. Instead, she wiggles around a bit, and tightens her hold on him, and waits.

The laughter and bells have stopped, and momentarily, it sounds like all of the horses have stopped too.

Benny looks up to see the fairy woman who had been heading the procession bringing her horse around so she’s right above the two of them – looking down with a raised eyebrow and a slight smirk.

“ _Well,_ ” she says, sounding more amused than anything else. “This certainly is a turn of events. Are you sure you pulled down the right rider?”

“Pretty sure,” Benny says. Her heart is beating so fast she’s pretty sure that everyone in the procession can hear it.

“Really?” says the fae on the midnight horse. “Because traditionally, it’s the tithe to hell that the headstrong, lovely maiden rushes in to rescue. Not one of the Court.”

“I’m not a lovely maiden,” Benny says, glaring. “I’m a dirt-encrusted hooligan, and this is the one I want. So go ahead. Do your worst.”

“Very well,” says the fae with a smile that proves that her teeth are just as numerous and _wrong_ as her horses are. In Benny’s arms, Trouble breathes in – a sudden, sharp intake of breath, and then she’s hugging a struggling, roaring lion three times her size, which is really an excellent thing that’s happening and absolutely how she wanted to be spending her evening.

“Could be worse,” she pants optimistically, struggling to keep hold. “Least you’re soft now. You’re normally all – _ugh –_ bony elbows and shoulders, makes you _horrible_ to hug – ”

The lion roars in her face, teeth horribly sharp and just inches from her nose. Its breath is hot and sticky, and she grits her teeth and buries her face into its mane, which is coarse and scratchy and terrible but at least she doesn’t have to look right at it. _Sure,_ she thinks, _go ahead, bite my head off, do it_ – but then the lion isn’t there anymore, and instead she’s got an unimaginably long snake tangled all around her, and she’s fighting to keep a good grip on it even as it tries its damn best to get away. She scrabbles frantically for a good handhold, and tries to wind it back around her arms and body and restrain it from getting away, but its long emerald body is smooth and lithe and it twists until she grabs it with both hands and squeezes it as hard as she can to drag it back to her, upon which it rears up and hisses out a long rattle of a warning, and then almost immediately –

– sinks its fangs right into her bare, exposed arm, and she _yells_ , tears streaking down her face even before she can fully understand what’s going on, and now she’s on fire and she’s burning and – okay, well, no, that’s not quite right. _She_ isn’t on fire, not really. She’s currently holding a fairy who’s just turned from a snake that _bit her and her arm still hurts like hell_ into a _literal a pillar of fire_ and she’s not quite sure how she’s still managing to do that, considering that fire is neither solid nor the sort of thing that people are traditionally able to hold on to. Her arm’s in agony still but she tugs him closer and yells something vague about hating him and hospital bills that even she’s having trouble processing and understanding.

The fire licks at her skin and she can smell her skin roasting and her hair burning, and then he’s an eagle who scratches violently at her, tearing her Isley Brothers shirt to shreds and lacerating her skin with its razor-sharp claws, and then he’s a stag with her legs around his neck and fingers wrapped tightly around his horns, and then a beast with a thousand eyes and teeth that could cut her in half with a single bite, and then an insect that she cups in her hands and curls herself around, and then a wolf who pins her to the ground even as she clings to its legs, and keeps on clinging even as it goes for her throat, and she _knows_ she’s going to die –

– and then Trouble is humanoid again, and they’re both shivering on the ground – him from overexertion and her from adrenaline and a truly excessive amount of pain that’s already fading, along with the wounds and burns all over her body. She’s fine. He’s fine. She’s holding onto him so tightly and desperately that she’s surprised he hasn’t snapped clean in half.

“Oh, _fine,_ ” says the fairy on the midnight horse, looking disappointed. “You’re no fun, either of you. You didn’t even _think_ about letting go – how horribly boring.”

“Thanks,” croaks Benny. “I aim to please.”

“I suppose he’s your problem now,” says the fae woman, and snaps her reins sharply. Her horse straightens up, and so does she. She regards Trouble with a piercing gaze. “You are, of course, aware that letting you go entirely is impossible.”

Trouble grunts softly. He’s still resting his forehead on Benny’s shoulder when he says, “I am. I will settle for the next best thing. Sever me and be done with it.”

The smile that curves up across her lips. “You,” and she says something that Benny can’t quite hear, but it makes Benny’s eyes water and her head hurt, then, “are hereby half-bound to the Unseelie Court. The _you_ that _you_ claim to be is banished from any location under its ownership. I do not need to tell you the penalty for breaking that, I’m sure.”

“But the warning is appreciated,” says Trouble, shifting in Benny’s arms so he can look at her properly.

Benny doesn’t understand what this means. She has the dim awareness that interrupting or making her presence any more known than it is would be a very bad idea indeed. For once in her life, she keeps her mouth shut.

“You have until midnight to vacate this area of the forest for as long as you remain yourself,” she says. “I will see you soon.”

“And I will not be myself when I do,” he murmurs. “Goodbye.”

She hums thoughtfully for a moment, then snaps her horse’s reins again, and she canters to the front of the procession without another word. After a moment, the riders begin to chatter amongst themselves once more – this time, incredulous and amazed, and then the bells start to chime, and the horses start to move, and then they’re all just riding off, like nothing had ever happened.

“The sacrifice,” Benny mutters under her breath – barely above a whisper, in case any of them can still hear her – and when he doesn’t respond, “come _on,_ Trouble – that kid from my class, we can’t just let him die –”

“You want me to anger the Court in the worst possible way, _just_ after committing the highest sort of treason right in front of the Imperiatrix?” he snaps back, incredulous.

“If you don’t do anything, the deal’s off,” she hisses, fingers digging sharply into his back.

His grip on her wrist tightens. “That’s not how this works and you know it.”

She growls wordlessly at him, and he growls right back at her, and then makes a noise of frustration – and, just as the procession rounds the curve of the path to disappear from sight forever, untangles himself from her just enough to snap his hand sharply in the direction of the ground. A nearly branch twitches minutely, then sweeps suddenly across, perfectly catching the kid by the back of his shirt. His white horse continues on without him, and just like that, he’s been removed from the procession without a sound.

Another twitch of Trouble’s wrist, and the kid’s been deposited, not ungently, in some nearby bushes. Benny waits anxiously for the sound of bells and silvery chatter to die away, and then she’s hauling Trouble to his feet and dragging him over by the arm (neither of them are letting go of each other just yet, by wordless mutual agreement) to the boy in the bushes.

He’s clearly dazed – his eyes are open and fully aware, but he seems pretty confused as to where he is and what’s going on if the expression on his face is anything to go by.

“Hey,” Benny says, and prods at him with the toe of her shoe. “ _Hey._ Get up.”

He shoots bolt-upright almost immediately, and says, “You – I – _huh?_ ”

“You got kidnapped by the fae court,” Benny tells him bluntly. “They were going to sell you to Satan – or the fairy equivalent, I guess? – but we rescued you. Which was very cool of us, if I do say so myself.”

“You’ll want to leave,” Trouble tells him quite seriously, catching the kid’s gaze. “I doubt they’ll stay ignorant to your unexpected departure for very long, and I don’t think you’ll want to be here when they come back for their missing sacrifice.”

“Wha-?” His words are slurred.

“Do you _want_ to get thrown into a hell pit or not?” Benny says incredulously. “Move! Town’s that way! Get out of here!”

He looks between the two of them, expression _completely_ terrified – which is a little unfair, considering he had just been on the way to be a literal hell sacrifice, and the two of them are the people who had just saved his skin – and then he stumbles to his feet and _bolts._ Right down the pathway leading away from where the fairy procession had just ridden to, in the direction of the town.

“Hey!” Benny yells after him. “You could at least _thank_ us!”

There’s no reply.

“That’s gratitude for you,” Trouble says, sighing, then, “and, speaking of gratitude – ”

She looks at him properly, and sees that he’s regarding her with what can only be described as an Extreme Emotion.

“Thank you,” he says, and squeezes her hand. “Truly, deeply.”

She squeezes back. “You could apologize for biting me with your stupidly poisonous fangs and trying to rip my throat out.”

“Yes, yes, of course – deepest apologies for both of those things. And anything else that’s worth apologizing for. Oh,” he lets out a sudden bark of laughter. “I’m _free._ ”

“You are, god help us all,” she says, and chokes on a sudden cackle – the laughter infectious, and they descend into slightly hysterical giggles for a good few seconds.

As it dies down, Benny comes to a conclusion. She lets go of his hand, and takes a few steps backwards, composing herself – and then turns to him again.

“My name is Bernice Summerfield,” she says, and extends her hand to back towards him. “But my friends, ideally, call me Benny.”

There’s an electricity in the air that isn’t just because of the storm that’s gathering overhead or the fairy riding party that had just passed through this part of the woods, only minutes ago. It’s an unresolved sort of chargedness, just waiting for an acceptable place to release itself. Benny can feel it, quite markedly. She thinks that she should probably also feel like she’s making another one of those trademark terrible mistakes of hers, but... for once, there’s none of that.

He stares at her for a very long second, and then takes her hand. As she watches, his form seems to shift and settle – to resolve into a dark-haired young man with piercing eyes, who appears to be about her age if you don’t focus all that long on it.

“Braxiatel,” he says, and she very nearly gasps aloud at the way her hair feels like it’s standing on end. “I’m not all that adept at having friends or nicknames, for that matter, but... I suppose you can call me ‘Brax’.”

“Oh,” she says, and then, as the weight of what’s just happened dawns entirely on her, “ _oh._ It’s – _hello._ Hi, Brax. It’s really good to meet you. Properly, you know.”

“Benny,” he says, and smiles at her like she’s just given him sunshine, all neatly packaged up and tucked in a box. “Likewise.”

There’s a moment of perfect silence where the electricity seems to settle all around them – discharging into the air and the trees and along every inch of Benny’s skin. The forest is quiet and everything is still. She could live in this moment forever.

“...This is very touching and symbolic, I’m sure,” says Brax with a grimace. “But we really do need to leave before every member of the Unseelie Court comes riding back to murder me personally for depriving them of their Halloween sacrifice.”

“Oh,” Benny says with a start, “oh god, you’re right. Okay. We’re going now.”

Together, they sprint at a breakneck pace down the path towards the town, and they don’t stop until they’re clear of the treeline and panting so hard that they can barely stand up straight.

“I’ve just realized that I’m going to need somewhere to stay,” Brax says when they’ve both recovered somewhat, with a mournful glance back in the direction of the forest. “It is... no longer safe for me in my usual territory.”

“Just come over to my house for tonight,” decides Benny.

“Are you sure?”

“Sure I’m sure.” She yawns. “We’re friends. We’re working on a school project. It’s fine. We can stay up late – later than we already _are_ staying up – and talk about, I don’t know, boys and fairies or something. I’ll make coffee.”

Brax shudders. It doesn’t look like he’s exaggerating it. “Is it too late to back out on this deal?”

“Fine – tea, then.” She slaps him lightly on the arm. “If I can find any.”

“So,” Brax says, as they set off towards her house, “tell me about this English assignment of yours. Any particular book? I may be familiar already.”

“Not a book,” says Benny, and then laughs and grabs his hand on an impulse. He doesn’t pull back. “You know what?” she says. “That’s weirdly on-the-nose; it’s actually _A Midsummer Night’s Dream –_ would you believe that?”

“I really don’t know,” he says, and smiles. The sky is full of stars and the trees are full of secrets and the night is full of possibilities. “At this point, I rather think I’d believe anything.”


End file.
